New Reality Seeds

[PTTG]

Nikolai Tesla's particle weapon proved reproduceable in 1919. The device is a kind of compact particle accelerator -- compact in that it's merely 20 feet long or so -- and it apparently accellerates bismuth ions to high speeds with extreme efficiency. Nonetheless, the need for electricity makes the devices essentially immobile.

Death-ray Domes spring up like mushrooms throughout Europe, as they are the ultimate defensive technology. Any aggressive troop movement can be cut down with a stroke. At the same time, by modifying the beam focus it is possible to bypass friendly forces and hit enemies past them, or to avoid over-penetrating enemy troops. With a maximum range of 20 miles, small countries can defend their borders with a dozen or so emplacements, large ones with hundreds.

It is now 1936. Now what?

[fchase8]

Originally Posted by Apollonian

The question with the Oregon Territory is, can the British control it in the face of American immigration, let alone military adventurism. That depends so much on other factors (where else Britain might focus its resources, how the internal politics of a US that stretches from Georgia to Nova Scotia shake out, how Spanish America changes based on the changes up north, etc.) that it can go however you like, I think. Maybe Britain encourages settlement on its own terms; maybe it just maintains outposts and slowly loses its hold while its attention shifts to India.

Yes, maybe a foothold colony, but nothing more.

American expansionism would be kicked up even more after taking Canada, with an even bigger push to the west. Perhaps an earlier Mexican-American War, potentially against Spanish Mexico, or getting involved in Mexican independence.

Originally Posted by tshiggins

Given the terrible hardship the Sikh's suffered at the hand of the Moghuls, and their loyalty to the British, I could see the Raj offering land in California to any Sikh who had worked with them.

Soldiers who honorably served for a period of, say, 20 years, could get a large plot (40-120 acres, maybe, depending on land quality) somewhere on the British Pacific Coast.

That's enough to raise a family and, with hard work, produce enough surplus to live pretty well. It also creates a culturally-distinct group with few ties to anyone else in California, but which is profoundly loyal to the Crown of the United Kingdom.

That's a neat idea, but probably wouldn't be too feasible. There wouldn't be enough loyal, long-working Sikhs to create a significant colony (the Americas are kind of the graveyard of conceptual colonies). It would be a long way away - why not Sikh settlements in Australia (in this world, or real life)?

And even if a settlement was established, it would face inevitable American expansionism - and white America never took kindly to Indians loyal to Britain in North America.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by fchase8

Yes, maybe a foothold colony, but nothing more.

American expansionism would be kicked up even more after taking Canada, with an even bigger push to the west. Perhaps an earlier Mexican-American War, potentially against Spanish Mexico, or getting involved in Mexican independence.




That's a neat idea, but probably wouldn't be too feasible. There wouldn't be enough loyal, long-working Sikhs to create a significant colony (the Americas are kind of the graveyard of conceptual colonies). It would be a long way away - why not Sikh settlements in Australia (in this world, or real life)?

And even if a settlement was established, it would face inevitable American expansionism - and white America never took kindly to Indians loyal to Britain in North America.

True, but then Britain practiced "divide and rule" with real callousness in North America. They wanted seperate groups to HATE each other and need Britain to mediate. The Native Americans of the US and Canada suffered badly because of this trick.

In Sri Lanka the Brits made the Tamils the bureaucrats and the professionals. They assumed that they could keep a minority running the country and that minority would need the British to survive and hold power. The natives of Sri Lanka ripped through that. It caused a really hellish civil war. I could see the Brits pulling similar stunts on the Sikhs with equally messy brutal resaults.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by PTTG

Nikolai Tesla's particle weapon proved reproduceable in 1919. The device is a kind of compact particle accelerator -- compact in that it's merely 20 feet long or so -- and it apparently accellerates bismuth ions to high speeds with extreme efficiency. Nonetheless, the need for electricity makes the devices essentially immobile.

Death-ray Domes spring up like mushrooms throughout Europe, as they are the ultimate defensive technology. Any aggressive troop movement can be cut down with a stroke. At the same time, by modifying the beam focus it is possible to bypass friendly forces and hit enemies past them, or to avoid over-penetrating enemy troops. With a maximum range of 20 miles, small countries can defend their borders with a dozen or so emplacements, large ones with hundreds.

It is now 1936. Now what?

Basically this is an improved Maginot Line. Hitler depended on two things to beat the French defenses. First, his armies out flanked the defenses. Second, the elite French officers dispised democracy in any form and especially loathed the then present French government. Hitler benefited from the French generals being unwilling to defend a democratic France.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by fchase8

why not Sikh settlements in Australia (in this world, or real life)?

There is a Sikh community at Woolgoolga in New South Wales, which was established in the 1880s. It's not very large, though.

[patchwork]

Here's a more modern one - Sankara. Thomas Sankara survives his assassination in 1987, executing the locals responsible and ostentatiously returning the French support to Paris, causing international embarrassment. He continues his modernization efforts, when Benin collapses without Soviet aid he steps in to provide relief and ultimately to accept their offer of union; when Togo has a coup he does the same; and when Cote d'Ivoire erupts in civil war he aids the insurgents, takes the capital, argues that new elections should be held to his old friends the French, and the new elections return more allies of his that seek union with Burkina Faso. When Mali becomes a mess in 2013 it is Burkinese troops who maintain order and hunt radical Islamists there; annexing it is a bit much but it becomes functionally a protectorate. His one failure was being unable to push for power-sharing or save his friend Gaddafi's life when the latter's number was finally up. Let's say a current year of 2022, he's spry, an international figurehead for antiglobalists and relict Marxists, an open set of arms for Chinese investment in Africa. And very much looking forward to the introduction of the Afro next year, a continental currency intended to be a counterpart to the Euro. South Africa and some of the other bigs are not early adopters, but it's him, Nigeria, Libya, Cameroon and Liberia at the least - a West African currency union today, an African one tomorrow.

On the one hand, this is a close parallel, and the ripples outside of Africa are so far minor. It could thus be a meeting place, equipment cache or whatever else you need it to be. But some analysts will suspect Sankara of having help, whether Homeline radicals or Wakanda Forever types, the Cabal, or Centrum thinking outside its box. An excuse to throw PCs into a very unfamiliar environment, with the actual enemy sponsorship being whatever you find interesting.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Geography-based seed, inspired by (though with several distinct differences from) this AlternateHistoryHub video: What if California was an island?

I'm inclined to make the Strait of Cortez a bit narrower than in the video, enough to make a bridge across it require a miraculous engineer rather than a straight-up miracle. On an actually-unrelated note, I'd also say the Native American population would be largely unchanged from our timeline. It would take longer for them to get there, sure, but not that much longer; Washington to NorCal and Senora to Baja aren't that long of a sea journey, even with AHH's map, and humans have sailed much farther with technology not that much greater than the first Native Americans. (Albeit ones with stronger maritime traditions, but at least some native Washingtonians would surely have enough fishermen to get some good sailors?)
These natives would, of course, be more isolated from mainland Native Americans. It's easy enough to migrate across those distances to an uninhabited island, but much trickier to do so when said island already has inhabitants. Not helping is that the Pacific Northwest housed the most-populous non-agricultural American societies, meaning that resistance to such occupation would be strong. (The barriers would be less serious around Senora, due to both the convenient terrain and the fact that, IIRC, Aztec agriculture didn't make it quite that far west.) The Californian Amerindians would have their own distinct culture, and would probably be physically distinct from Native Senorans or Washingtonians.
This would come in handy for that one event which changed American history more than any other—Europeans showing up to ruin everything. The Californians' isolation would make them less likely to be struck by the initial waves of plague which devastated the New World; they might not face any significant European disease until missionaries came, and missionaries would have an unusually high probability of wanting to minimize death tolls. (After all, it's hard to convert dead people...especially when your god happened to show up at the same time as an apocalyptic plague.) Moreover, California wouldn't have seemed like such an attractive colonization target, since it was so isolated. Mexicans living in Senora would probably have a healthy trade with the Baja Californians, which would give the Californians access to plenty of European crops and technology. All things considered, the Native Californians would probably be doing pretty well for themselves (you know, compared to other native peoples of non-Eurasian continents).

Then the Mexican-American war comes. I'm inclined to agree with AHH's conclusions about America's demands; they'd want Senora and would probably pick up that huge, uncivilized island along with it. And what would the destiny of this region be? California would probably always be a backwater. Nobody would think twice about it until someone discovered gold, probably not until close to the 20th century, and even then the pains of traveling to California would keep the rush much smaller than in our timeline. The population would have a large proportion of natives, something like OTL Hawaii.
The rest of the American West would be rural backwaters as well, with few rivers or ports providing easy trade with other parts of the world. Senora and Washington would probably have one significant port each, for trade with Latin America and Asia, but connections between the West Coast and the rest of the world would be weaker. In particular, there would be a lot fewer Asian-Americans; between the lower demands for infrastructure in the West and the increased difficulty of getting Asians to almost anywhere in the USA, the desire for Asia's cheap labor would be less pronounced than in our timeline.
This might change somewhat if bridges to California were ever built, but this would probably require large cities in California and in the west (specifically, the parts far from the OTL-coastal lowlands). It might not happen until late in the 20th century, or even later. But once it did, California would be the new wild place to go on vacation or set up quiet homes far from civilization. It's a lot nicer than most places OTL Americans have to go if they want to get far from big cities.

It's hard to say what the bigger effects would be. Mexico would be a bit weaker. The USA would probably also be weaker, and maybe a bit less interested in matters outside the American continent. Maybe this would have serious butterfly effects down the road, maybe it wouldn't.

[adm]

I suspect that California would still be important sooner. It's climate in the San Joaquin Valley grows a lot of varied food types. and geologists would be taking a hard look at the Sierra Nevadas by the 1890's for mineral wealth, if not earlier.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by GreatWyrmGold

Washington to NorCal and Senora to Baja aren't that long of a sea journey, even with AHH's map, and humans have sailed much farther with technology not that much greater than the first Native Americans. (Albeit ones with stronger maritime traditions, but at least some native Washingtonians would surely have enough fishermen to get some good sailors?)

Some of the northwest coastal tribes had a pretty substantial maritime raid and trade network, never mind fishing and whaling.

Moreover, California wouldn't have seemed like such an attractive colonization target, since it was so isolated.

Water isn't a barrier, it's a highway way better than any land connection prior to the invention of railroads has a hope of being. If anything having more coastline makes you less isolated from European imperialism. And anyway California already was a fairly late colonization target, mostly because it was so far away by water, what with that continent getting in the way. In terms of sailing difficulty it's probably further away from Europe than Australia or China.

In fact American mythology aside, even in 1849 most of the gold rush staged through the port of San Francisco, and the biggest fraction of it that had an overland stage crossed Mexico and took a boat north.

[fchase8]

This is a write-up of a world from GURPS Alternate Earths, Bonaparte-1.

Blurb from the book:

Bonaparte-1 (Q6, current year 1895), a TL6 worldline in which Nelson died in an attack on Boulogne in 1801. Without Nelson, Trafalagar ended as a Franco-Spanish victory, and Napoleon dictated peace from the Tower of London in 1806. France lost the War of 1812 trying to retake Louisiana from America, and the French Empire came apart in a series of German, Italian, and colonial rebellions in 1848-1850. Russia and America (which annexed Mexico in 1853) are dominant powers quarreling over China.